I had an affair

How is that for a revealing first blog. Yes it is over. The affair ended. Don’t all affairs end. Here is the catch, my affair was different. Not because we were in love or anything like that. But our affair was very different. Statistically different.

We each left our spouse to be together. This is statistically different than most extramarital affairs. My “partner” and I are not proud of how we got here. We would both say we got here because we were chicken. Too chicken to leave our spouses. We would say we had an affair to keep our family in tact. We knew we would not survive in our respective marriages, and we did not want to end our marriages because of the children, so we tried to find emotional support somewhere else to help make the marriage sustainable. But it didn’t work.

Are we happier now. We would both say yes. Is there pain. Unequivocal, horrible pain. Are our spouses happier? His appears to be, mine appears not to be. This has a lot to do with the initial psychological health of our partners.

Why the blog? Because I want people to learn from my mistakes and my courage. I also want people to know statistics are not always correct. Even morality is not black and white. I want to tell my story because I have a need to. I need people to understand that like anything, getting what you want does not come without pain and struggle. And getting what you want also comes with immense joy.

I guess I am writing to promote conversation. I am writing to see if when the story is told, the full story, will people look at themselves differently. Will people see that it is not the act, but how people react to an act that has the ability to strengthen or destroy.